2002 A meeting in Poland

"A.A.s from 13 countries travel to Warsaw, Poland in April 2002 for an Eastern European Service Meeting (EESM). Joining delegates from Belarus, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Poland, Russia, Romania, Slovakia, and Ukraine are guests from Germany and Finland. The meeting is meant to serve as a bridge to World Service Meetings for countries that do not yet participate in them. Since the early 1980s, A.A. Germany had sponsored groups in former East Germany and in Czechoslovakia and Hungary, while Finland provided much support for Russia. In many countries, membership will continue to surge - particularly in Poland and Russia, which in 2004 will have 1,700 and 300 groups respectively."

(AAWS Inc)

1988 Baltic State start-ups

"June 1988 sees the founding of Lithuania's earliest known group, which meets in the Vilnius apartment of Romas O. Romas had set foot on the road to sobriety when he read a Lithuanian translation of the Big Book in the fall of 1987. In late 1988, Romas and fellow group members visit Riga, Latvia, and correspond regularly with that city's first group, founded by Pëteris and Austris in November 1988. A.A.s will begin meeting in neighboring Estonia in 1989, in Tallinn."

(AAWS Inc)